12+1 Core Values: Praise Generating | Eld Peng Hoe

You're listening to a message to go from acts church.

We hope this message will light up your day.

Value number ten today, Okay, And it's praise generating.

Okay, are you ready? Okay? I teach.

Usually even though praise, you'll be thinking, I'll be bouncing

off the wall trying to talk about praise. Yeah, maybe

maybe I might get evan bouncing off the wall afterwards.

But it's another very very powerful core value. And you know,

if you actually take your Bible and you just half fit,

you will end up at what book usually? You know, yes,

you actually end up with a book of psalms right

in the middle of your scriptures are actually a collection

of songs.

That's the reality of it.

And at the heart of God's revelation is this lovely

collection of praises.

Of uh poetry.

And you know, God actually speaks to his people very differently.

If you study the scriptures. Some things are written very poetically.

Some things are written in a more narrative form. And

usually how I understand the scriptures is when God is

dictating or when the words are like narration. When you're

reading the scriptures, he's trying to appeal to our intellect.

He's trying to speak to us knowledge toru hate knowledge

to a certain extent, helping us to understand. But when

you read poetry, he's speaking to our heart. And God

speaks to both our minds and our heart. Poetry is

quite nice and heart. That's what we always feel, very

fluffee when we wait poetry or not or raled up.

But that's the reality of it. And so you know.

Psalms Chapter one.

It begins with a warning there are that there are

two ways in life. There is a way that leads

to life, and there is a way that leads to death. Essent,

what is it telling us is telling us that all

of us have a choice. Psalms one versus one too says, oh,

the choice of those who do not follow the advice

of the wicked, or stand around with sinners or join

in with mockers. But they delight in the law of

the Lord, meditating on it day and night. Before you

can sing any of the other songs in the book

of Psalms, you have to decide whether you are going

to walk in the way of the godly or in

the way.

Of the wicked.

A choice has to be made, and that is the

reality of it.

It is no use.

Sometimes no, we come and we attend service, and we

join together in singing. We enjoy the song and the

dance and the music. Without having first made this choice

and this decision, it would not make sense. So there

is a blessing pronounce at the beginning of the Psalms

on those who have made the choice to be with

God's people, to be planted by the river and to

produce fruit. Read the Psalms and you will understand and

you will see it. Then from that choice onwards, throughout

the entire book of Psalms, you actually will have a

whole gamut of experiences, or whole range of experiences of.

A man or a woman of God.

You have the depths of despair, and then also there

is the heights of joy.

You read it. The Psalms are lovely.

When you read it and you really meditate upon it,

you know it's something that you realize. In this world

you can find unimaginable pleasure, and you can also find

excruciating pain and everything in between.

But as you draw towards.

The end of the Book of Psalms, you will realize

that we have arrived. Therefore, in what is sometimes known

as the Hallelujah psalms, the Hailleljah salms, and that's what

I'm actually going to be teaching on today. And know,

if you think about it, the word Hallelujah is probably

the only Christian word that doesn't quite need translation. It's

hallelujah for almost every language. You go anywhere in the

world and you Hallelujah one time, and if there's a

Christian in the room, the flower turn and look at you.

Because even the name of Jesus is a bit different. No,

it's Jesus here, it's Yesu's in oursi Campo is Yasu.

In the Chinese church is Jesus.

I don't know. I don't know.

Actually it's not like I'm just saying it, but I

don't know. I don't know what to say in Spanish.

But it's it's different. But Hallelujah remains consistent and the

same and in the exact same form and even.

True that we you know, we when we read.

These psalms you realize that what is it at the

end of it all is this sense of praise. Praise

is the end. What is the chie end of a

man ultimately is to glorify God. That is what you

and I are created for. That is why God made you.

God made you and I to generate praise. And a

lot of times we find this quite baffling because we're like, God,

why do you create me? And you know, I still

remember when I went for a Missions Bible study called Perspective.

They care for this big book, you know, textbook, textbook,

I don't know, almost out hundreds and hundreds of pages,

and it started off by saying, we are created only

for one purpose, to worship God. To praise and to

worship God. That is what life is about. And sometimes

it can be quite baffling, you know, in a missions

class or missions a Bible study on Missions, it starts

off by realizing that very very fact. And I think

it really really put a lot of things into perspective,

even for me, because you know, you think about it

a lot of times when we talk about deity, what

will happen to us?

And we will go to heaven or go to heaven? Yeah, actually,

what will happen in heaven? Now?

And I'm like stretching the scriptures and I realized, in

heaven we praise and worship God. Uh, that is that all? Yes,

we praise and worship God all the time, all the time. Yeah,

actually we praise and worship God forever and ever. Awlo

be like, uh, yeah, I don't know whether I want

to sign up for that. Ever felt that way, not

like praise and worship God forever and ever. It's like

here Sunday, I show so I restless ready, Ah, this

is where we have to read.

This is the reality, the reality of it as humans.

So I pray that today we realize that as people

we are able to generate praise. It is our responsibility

to do so. Because there will come a day when

your soul will never be cast down again. There will

come a day when you will not have to pray

for deliverance from your enemies, because God will deliver you finally,

for sure, and He will deliver you from all illnesses,

all sickness. They will come a day when prayer will

give way to just praisers. Why would you need to

pray in heaven. There's no need to pray in heaven.

God heal me, God fix that person who is you know,

everyone is going to be well, and so that's why

we will be praising God. And when that day comes.

That is the picture that the book of Psalms is

actually painting for all of us. And so the Book

of Psalms pictures the whole Christian life, from the first

choice to walk the way of the Godly to the

final moment of sheer praise where there is nothing else

but praise. You see that, And let's go straight now

into the Psalms that talk about praise. And I want

us to just have that in the back of my mind,

that our minds, that really we are created essentially to praise.

God and worship Him.

And I pray that if it's anything today that I

can get into the depths of your soul and spirit

is to realize that this is an amazing honor. This

is an amazing privilege given to us as believers to

be able to not just do this here on earth,

but to do this forever also in heaven. That's the

promise of eternity. And I pray we will never think that.

I don't think I'm looking forward to heaven. I my

responsibility is you train you all all up so that

you can do it here well, and then do it

up there forever. I think to do something for a

long time, we only need some training, Like okay, Okay,

cool Ah, Cool Okay, Psalms one hundred and forty nine.

He says this, Praise the Lord.

Sing to the Lord a new song, saying praises in

the assembly of the faithful. All Israel, rejoice in your maker,

All people of Jerusalem, exult in your King. Praise his

name with dancing, accompanied by tambourine and harp. For the

Lord delights in his people. He crowns them. He crowns

the humble with victory. Let the faithful rejoice that He

honors them. Let them sing for joy as they lie

on their baits. Let the praises of God be in

their mouths, and a sharp sword in their hands, to

execute vengeance on the nations and punishment on the peoples.

To bind their kings with shekels and their leaders with

iron chains, to execute the judgment written against them. This

is the glorious privilege of his faithful ones.

Praise the Lord okay.

Basically, Psalms one for nine gives us instructions in praise,

and the first command is this, God actually can get

tired of all songs. I know sometimes we all like

all the evergreen songs, all of us. God is biased

one whatever genre we like is based on the era,

or for some of us, is the epoch that we

once existed. Its existed in a long ago era. But

you know, when I was young, I used to hop

into the car and all my dad ever plays is

from Light and Easy, which I'm like, why do you

need to listen to light?

And give me something a bit more rancher.

Then now that I get to his age, well the

age when you know when my dad used to play

light and Easy, I start to appreciate light and Easy also.

So it's sort of changes sometimes, right, But that's the truth.

God actually can get tired of all songs. And I

mentioned this because there is within us that sometimes the

propensity to just.

Go with the familiar. And I am all for remembering.

And singing hymns and the songs in which we have

grown up with, because these are the songs that we

committed to memory because we sang it over and over again.

I think it's powerful that we can actually commit some

of these songs to memory because a lot of these

wonderful songs. Do you know the Wesley brothers themselves, I

think they said they probably wrote I think it was

Charles Wesley that wrote most of the songs about six

thousand hymns or whatever that you have in the Methodist

Church hymnal. I think it's only a fraction of what

he has written. The truth is many, many songs of

the old and powerful, and these songs are really written

from the heart, written from scriptures. And you know, the

songs of the older don't repeat one. No, it's like

every verse is one bunch of new words ones. Nowadays

everything's on repeat, repeat, so it's easier to learn.

But it's okay.

You know, there is a time and there is a

place to sing familiar songs, but the instruction here is

singing to the Lord a new song. Let him have

a fresh time of praise and worship for us. If

we only stay with the old songs, our spiritual life

can sometimes grow a little bit still, a little bit stagnated,

and we can actually risk becoming nothing more than a

spiritual parrot.

That means we keep parroting the same thing.

And that shouldn't be right, That shouldn't be Because there

are those you know, that I continue to encourage, especially

those who have the gift in creating music, writing songs,

and I tell them keep writing, doesn't matter sometimes they

can write songs by people don't quite like, don't sing

the songs that they write. But I always telling them

that if you've written it from the heart, keep writing,

because ultimately, if God's mercies can be new every morning,

then so should our praise and our worship unto Him

always be refreshed and renewed as well.

Shouldn't it be that way?

And so we are to sing in our meetings because

God loves to hear his children singing together, praising our

maker and praising our King. And you know, the Psalms

doesn't just stop stare, know it. So it talks about

singing a new song. Don't remain stagnated. Uh. And that's

why we I mean, I'm someone who is I remind

myself every genre is fine, whatever it is, every song

that is written, as long as it's written from the heart,

I believe we can sing it.

Uh.

In fact, I will encourage more of our own people

to write songs and not be dependent on others and

wait on them.

We can also do it ourselves. And so I'm grateful.

As a church, I think we have had and we

still have different ones who continue to write, and I

think that's what's going to be pleasing to God.

But the song the Psalms doesn't just stop there. It

continues on.

Uh and it says, now praise Him with the whole body.

Ah.

Why should it be right to use our vocal cards,

our tongues, our mouth, our lips, and not use the

rest of our body?

Ever thought about it?

So we have hands, okay, even if you use your

hand to pick up the hymnal, which we don't have today,

I think that's also a form of worship now because

sometimes a lot of people will just hold their.

Hands when we worship, when we praise God.

Even if you just use your legs to stand up

when you're praising and when you're worshiping God, I think

that's also a form of praise and worship in terms

of reverence where very important. I know some of us

we just want to sit when we praise and we worship.

But the scripture says, use every part of your body.

That's why Romans chapter twelve, verse one says we are

to present our bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and

acceptable to Him. Which is which is, which is our

spiritual worship.

This is how we worship God, and it's.

So important that we continue to worship God because he

is worthy.

You see.

One of the reasons that we have wrong impressions of

worship is this.

We always ask the wrong question. We always ask did

I enjoy worship or not today?

No, when we come to church, today's worship or today

or today full band rocking? Uh, you know, on the

days when it's just mister Stevens and his guitar a

bit flat.

Not today.

There's the wrong question actually, to ask about praise and worship.

Not to say that I hope we all don't enjoy

prais and I pray and I hope you enjoy praise

and worship. But even if you don't, that's not the

important thing. The important question is did God enjoy the worship?

Did God enjoy the praises? It is immediately after this

verse on dance and instrumental worship that we are told

the Lord takes the light in his people. No, he

takes the light when we offer our hire being unto

him in praise and worship. And that is the test

of true worship, whether God has enjoyed it not, whether

we have and we have we and you know when

we meet together, when we live our praisers together, God

will bless us. That is the power of praising and

worshiping it. He says that He will inhabit the praises

of his people. And so that is the true test

of worship that we must always ask, and I always believe.

You know, God can use an entire band, an entire band,

if they are all there with the heart of worship,

you can do an amazing job leading people and leading

the congregation into praising God. But God can also use

one person. God can also use someone who is tone deaf.

You know that someone who is tone deaf, and that

person can be standing next to you and lifting his

voices voice praising God. I think God will accept his worship.

Do know whether the rest of us will accept it.

But God will accept it. That's the truth, right, And

so that's the question that we have to ask. That's

why we have come to this place even as a church.

That really is not about how many instruments we have,

though I would say it is important.

Instruments are there for a reason.

It's to help, is to assist, is to facilitate, is

to use the talent. It's not so much the instrument

the talent that God has given you with the instrument

to present it again as a living sacrifice. And so

the Lord delights in his people. He gives victory to

the humble. Are we therefore humble enough to acknowledge that

it is not about us or how we feel? Are

we able to say, Lord, I will praise you because

you are worthy of it and because it pleases you.

That is the position and the posture in which we

need to take and we need to accept when it

comes to praising God the psalms. Then continue to say

this thing for joy as you lie on your bait.

Is there is there? Okay? Wouldn't there be something wrong?

If we sing the praise of God only in the

assembly of the messes, and everyone faithful here singing, then

only we can sing, but we never sing when we

are by ourselves. The two belong together. If you only

sing songs and hymmes when you're in church, then you

should examine your soul and ask yourself, am I well

because as as someone who and I'm not someone who's

musically inclined, but I think I can still live and

raise my voice to praise God even though things are

not well. And it's basically some of these things are

practices that you need to exercise. But sometimes we come

to church and that's the only time that we can

praise God.

I praise God. Also if there's the only time you

can praise God.

Hallelujah, because there are many who come to and cannot

praise God as well. Doesn't come out you find your

such as words are not coming out. I pray today

our posture would change and we will understand. And I'm

going to continue teaching line by line in the scriptures.

But we're moving along, okay, moving along. So remember you

can praise God in the public. You can also praise

God in the private. In fact, you should be praising

God both in public and also on your bit at home.

Meditate on His words so important. And we move along.

And now suddenly from our personal moments in the bed room,

it starts talking about battle, battlefield, better ground, and we're

Black Sally.

It says vengeance on the people. Let those who have a.

Song in their troths have a two aged sword in

your hands. That's what the scriptures are essentially saying. And

it's quite extraordinary. You know, from the a concert. Now

we are going into conflict from song. We are going

into battle. Why does David include this in the sum

Surely it was going to be a sum of worship, praise, singing,

dancing publicly and privately. Why suddenly he starts talking about

the battle Phiel And the answer is this, the song

is in the troth and the sword is in the hand,

and they are necessary to each other, necessary, very very important.

Because there are some Christians who love to sing, but

they never bought it to fight, and then there are

some Christians who love to fight, but they never sing.

The two actually goes hand in hand together. Remember the

battle in the Old Testament where they put the singers

in the front line. And that's why when we do

our prayer, our four times prayer in the year, the

last one is you're usually called Judah first. Praise comes first.

Race is always on the front line, and that is

a good place to put them right in the front line,

not just because they raise the first brand of the attack,

but because they actually have the best weapon, and the

best weapon you can have in any battlefield is praise.

Let me explain this.

There are those who sing but do not fight, who

just want a long glorified celebrations. Sometimes we only sing

where everything is happy, happy days, but we don't want

the discipline and the duty. You know why it's so

important signs we remind the extreme band no even to

have the talents os. Okay, you're a talenteder. You pick

up anything so we can make music out of the way.

God bless you. I pray you use it. But most

of the musicians, they need to practice or not. It's

a lot of hard work and toil. And one of

the things that I realize today is in our day

and age, it's a little bit harder to get our

children to learn instruments, and we are finding it finding

that challenge also because now this is now. This we

teach by you feel like it. Today okay you learn

or today you die? Okay, back then, send or any

I never known a nice, friendly piano teacher.

Never.

Every piano teacher got something, some weapon to beat the

music out of you.

Seriously, seriously, that's the true. It's like last time I

never learned.

I My parents spent me music classes, but my sister

I don't know. Back then, every daughter you in case

you can't do anything, you can become piano teacher.

Uh that was the parents' mindset. Those are my generations,

they will know.

So they sent my sister and they will wag the

knuckles if you don't play your skill properly. Because my

sister after grade five, she is totally like, ah, done

with this. She hated it so much because she's like, not,

I'm gonna use skills for anything anyways, I don't know, okay,

But that's the truth.

The discipline and the duty. It's not easy.

A lot of us sometimes we want to stay far

behind the line singing battle songs. We don't mind singing

the songs, okay, right, right, everyone, but we don't want

to sing them in battle. And so we got to

be in both the doing and the singing. And it

is a temptation when we are gathered together to sing

and to praise God, to forget that we need a

sword in our hands. We have got a battle facing us.

And I believe you know, the devil pays special attention

to those who are leading people in worship. That's why musicians,

that's why we always tell those who are on frontline ministry,

we call them the frontliners as well, because they are

leading from the front. It's so important for them to

have God's words in their lives. You think about it,

many revivals around the world has disappeared because of this

very reason. Because they can continue singing, the songs can

live on. You know a lot of revivals that you read,

A lot of songs have come out from the revivals.

When the revival takes place, usually they will sing and

they will worship for days without ending. But then after

a while it goes off, it fizzles out because many

times the song is there, but there was not enough

teaching of God's words underneath the singing to give it

its foundation.

And you will see you'll still hear hymns.

Actually, you go to the UK today, you will hear

hims more in the football stadium than in the churches.

No serious, how many Menu supporters here Glory Glory Man United?

Well, what tune is that? It's a hymn. I'm a

Spur supporter.

It's the same. It's a hymn when the Spurs go

marching on? Is a Christian hymn? Actually, by what have

they done the music remain take it and put our

football club. Of course, I know those flirts were really

praying that their club were winlass seriously they were. But

you remove what's word from it when it's supposed to

essentially go hand in hand. They're supposed to be together.

So the song in the troth itself is not enough.

We've got to realize that there is God's word, and

so the Salmi su pushed these two things together. Let

your song be in your troth, and let the sword

be in your hand. Let us fight, and let us

worship the Lord in beauty, Praise the Lord. The glory

for his faithful people is the glory of having fought.

And won, and then they can sing. Isn't that what

praise is about?

Have you noticed that singers who have had real battles

to fight, who have gained the victory in Christ, they

have a dimension in their singing that really is not

just something contained within them. It's something that they can

really encourage many others as well. Because they have true

been through the battles in life. Their entire life generates praise.

And this is not just something for individuals. This is

something for each and every one of us. Our entire

life is able to generate praise.

Amen.

Yeah, I'm gonna hurry harry a bit Psalms one hundred

and fifty. It goes on and I'm going to read

it very quickly. Praise the Lord. Praise God in his sanctuary,

Praise Him in his mighty heaven. Praise him for his

mighty works. Praise his unequal greatness. Praise him with the

blast of the rams horn. Praise him with the lire

and harp. Praise him with the tambourine and dancing. Praise

him with the strings and flutes. Praise him with a

clash of symbols. Praise him with loud, clanging symbols. Lead

everything that breathes, sink praisers to the Lord. Praise the Lord.

So some final few words in the psalms, the battle

is now behind us, and here is a little picture

of the fact that in heaven the battle is over.

That's why I mentioned just now.

Understand, once you get to have a normal fighting, no

more battles, but you have some couplets, say, okay, some

pairings that when you read the Summer, you realize, praise

the Lord, and then it's also praise God, and we

need to keep in balanced Lord and God.

If you study the.

Scriptures, you will realize Lord normally connotes an intimate term.

There is a personal relationship with this Lord. Whereas God

is a bit of an impersonal term but for a

great creator. So we need to keep the intimacy and

the reverence together. Do you realize that today sometimes this

is also very lopsided. Some hours can be so intimate

with the Lord. Oh Jesus, I love you, you love me.

I can do whatever and you will always still love me,

and that's awesome. We are so intimate, but there's no

when you do whatever you want, that's not reverence. That's

the honors truth. But sometimes it's all about the reverence.

Lord.

You say this, I do this, you do It's almost

like the Pharisees. And then they become very legalistic, but

there is no intimacy with the Lord. It becomes very hot.

Love and hardness don't always go hand to hand, and

so praise God, Praise the Lord, they go hand in hand.

We need to balance together, not just the God who

is intimate and the God whom we revere, we also

need to balance the local and the universal. That's why

he says, praise God in his sanctuary and praise God

in his firmament. Praise God when you're meeting together locally,

but universally as well. We praise God. We live our

praisers unto him. There is a balance here between praising

God for what he does, all his mighty we praise him,

and also who he is, his excellent greatness. We need

to keep that balance to so remember that. So all

this when you're reading, that's why poetry is beautiful, because

it has all these different dynamics in the language that

helps you see this is essentially how we are to

live our lives. We worship Lord Jesus, and we worship God,

the creator of the heavens and the earth Lord and God,

and that's wonderful. And then he goes on to talk

about the whole orchestra. Suddenly the whole variety of instruments

start coming in. And so let's also get it past

our minds that sometimes God thinks or only likes quiet

music or things to be quiet. Sometimes we have this

whole idea that for it to be worshipful, it has

to be quiet, it has to be a bit more

more reverence, because there are times, and I agree, there

are times when quieter, gentler music can really be powerful.

But the law also says praise praise Him with symbols,

not just symbols, No clashing symbols.

I don't know whether you are you know I now this.

Even when I go to government schools and kabangsa and schools,

they have the Chinese uh lying down strop and uh

may boys and all are playing no no, no more,

not always just compunk. Last time we go kabanksan school

or compunk, now it's like, oh, the Chinese don't the chunk.

Chunk has the.

Chug uh and the chunk is usually that symbol that

is super loud. And know, whenever I go and they

welcome and I stand next to them after that is

what you call it. The ringing the year. You need this,

you have like ringing a year for the next day.

But that's that's how how it is. Praise the Lord

with symbols. See, God wants every style of music, quiet

the noisy. He wants every kind of instrument. He wants

every kind of temperament, all harmonized together in an orchestra

to his praise.

Amen.

In fact, the Psalms just stops there. It says, let

everything that has breath praise the Lord. God wants everything,

not just one type, not just this type. Or that's

why unity guard it because when in our differences, we

can praise God. That is power in our own uniqueness.

You think everyone on this band likes a single genre

of music. No, they all have their own choices. They

all have no even say I'm metal and he's not metal. No,

Evon is a finger plucking kind of Latin star. I've

seen Evan do that on the guitar. He's done things

on the guitar that you all haven't releasedeen fully yet.

But that's the that's the reality of it.

Every difference can come together in unity and praise God.

Doesn't stop there. It says, let everything that has breath

praise the Lord. You know, most of us things that

God gave us breath primarily to breathe in. Only it

is important and keep breathing, okay, But God made us

so that we can also breathe out. The breeding out

is not just somethings we think our brief hour is

just to throw things away, you know, expel carbon dioxide. No,

the breeding out actually enables us to communicate. That's what

is essentially doing. Breath was given so the egg can

enter into our body and make sure that all our

organs can function properly. Very very important and give me

another ten minutes. I'll try to end. Okay, but it

can also and it should also leave our bodies so

that it can help our soul.

It's two parts. So we are given breath to praise.

So let everything that has breath, Let everything that breathes

praise God. Use the breath not just for our own good,

not just to keep our bodies going, but to breathe

out the glory of God and to breathe out his praises.

Can we then, therefore praise Him all the time. It's

the question that we have to ask. In Habaku chapter three,

verses seventeen to eighteen, we read this, even though the

fig trees have no blossoms and there are no grapes

on the vines, even though the olive crop fails and

the fields lie empty and barren, even though the flocks

die in the fields and the cattle barns are empty.

Yet I will rejoice in the Lord. I will be

joyful in the God of my salvation. What happened to Habako,

Let's run through it very quickly. He's praying, and he's

asking God to come in power, even though the situation

around him is bleak. It's all doom and gloom, and

he's full of disappointments. But then he receives a vision,

then he acknowledges the mighty works of God. He has

a tremendous emotional release thereafter, and he starts singing what

actually happened to him? Well, he has been filled with

the Holy Spirit, and that is what has taken place

when you choose to praise in the spirit rather than

the man in the spirit. And sometimes we can do that.

In fact, we have a whole book called Lamentations dedicated

to complaints. It's the truth, but no one wants to read. Okay,

read Lamentations is good, but the truth is. You know,

sometimes you're like, woae is me?

Woe is me? Jeremiah is going on and on. You know,

when we read.

Ecclesiastist sometimes it's like everything is pointless, everything is meaningless.

It's a lot of complaints.

But when you turn it around and all of these books,

there is something beautiful at the end of it, even

in complaints. If you realize that you can praise God

even in the midst of your challenge. And I want

you to know, whether it's Ecclesiastics or Lamentations, No, that's

profit Jeremiah who wrote Ecclesias this. Solomon wrote, Acclesias, I

believe they're all. They're all one of the cloud of

witnesses that are cheering us on. Meaning they completed their tasks,

they ran their race, they ran it well, they ran

it all the way to the end. Their race is

not finished yet, even though they are they've done all

that they can. Now the only thing that they're doing

is cheering us on. And they're saying, hey, you know

what the board lamentations is telling you, Jeremiah saying, if

the going gets tough, praise, no matter how challenging is

praise no King Solomon, He's trying to tell you, Kay,

wo is me?

Wo is here? Wo is everything? Everything is meaningless.

But still praise God because he is the King of

kings and the Lord of all. And so with dead

Habaco started praising because he was filled with the Holy Spirit,

so fool that he is now overling with the Lord,

true prophetic spirit that leads people to see visions and

dream dreams. You know, the prophetic spirit when it's releasing,

also comes out sometimes in music, comes out in prayer,

comes out in praise. And so we have a choice

just as I started today's message by highlighting Psalms chapter one.

We must decide if we are going to walk with

God or walk away from him our mouths. It starts

with our mouths and how we allow our mouths to

work and operate. Is it going to be pursed and

closed or is it going to be open for release?

You see James Chapter three, verses nine to ten tells

us something about our tongues. Says that the tongue can

praise our Lord and Father, and sometimes it curses those

who have been made in the image of God, and

so blessing and cursing come pouring out all the same mouth. Surely,

my brothers and sisters, this is not right. This is

James writing. And James says something. Our tongue is like

a fog, and the fog tongue is like what a

snake has two parts. We can bless people, we can

curse people. We can praise God, we can criticize people.

We can say nice things, we can say nicety things.

It's almost like human nature. Quite ski zoean right. We

can bless and we can curse with the same tongue.

It's an extraordinary contradiction. Actually, and so here we have

been given tongues by God to use to praise and

bless Him and to bless other people. Or are we

going to allow our tongues to be used to condemn

and judge instead? You see, to generate praise is a choice.

Even in the dungeon, Pall and Silas generated praise. You

think praise came about because they thought, if I praise God,

I think he will set me free. No praise generated

from within because of who God is. It is because

God is worthy that we praise him, not because we've

got something to get at the end of the bargain.

It's not that. And so Paul and.

Silence chose to generate praise instead of curse their luck.

They can generate praise on the hilltop or even in

the dungeon. And that's why the early Church that we

witnessed in Acts chapter two, they came together.

They worship together at the Temple each day.

Daily men in homes for the Lord's supper shared their

meals with great joy and generosity all the world, praising

God and enjoyed the good will of all the people.

And each day the Lord added to their fellowship those

who were being safe daily they praise God. Nowadays sometimes

we reserve our singing and our praising for Sunday. Even that,

so the budget quite literal. And when we come and

you know, I believe her, And I don't think anyone

of us here is illiterate.

I don't think so. If you are, forgive me.

But if you can read, and you can sing, and

if all of us sing together, the roof of this

place will be lifted up. I really believe it with

all my heart. But a lot of times we hold back,

a lot of times we mumble. A lot of times

we we can't seem to find anything from within us

to praise God. And it is life. Life sometimes has

this way of dragging us down. But we are God's children.

That means we are able to generate praise, generate praise,

not because of what we have within us, generate praise because.

Of who lives in us. Remember that.

And so again, if you read and you study the

early Church, what was happening, Well, Bitter pointed out to

them what happened.

One hundred and.

Twenty people at the upper room were safe, sons and daughters,

and old men and young men made servants, men servants,

No look at them.

They were all.

Prophesying, they were all praising. The Holy Spirit came upon them,

empowered them. And what happened Their mouths will filled filled

with the Word of God, filled with tongues, and filled

with praisers, and filled with prophecies. And when every part

of us generates praise, the very act that God actually

deserves from us, you know, the name of Jesus will

inevitably belifted up on high. Because what we witnessed after

that was Peter preaching a powerful message. And from that message,

the first group of the new believers came about three thousand,

and he took one hundred and twenty of them to

actually disciple the three thousand. What did they do with them?

That's where we see the last few verses of x

chapter two. They came together. They met daily in the houses,

studying the scriptures together, eating together, praising God together. One

hundred and twenty was all it told to turn the

whole world upside down inside out. And today we are

where we are because they chose to praise God to

begin with. We pray for all to call on the

name of Jesus, because we know all who call on

the name of Jesus will be safe. The bank can

come up, and the band, and when you're going to

lead us as we praise God, then only do I believe,

and I still stand by believing that Hubbaku chapter two,

verse fourteen, you will one day come to pass, for as

the waters fill the sea, the earth will be filled

with an awareness of the glory of the Lord. Salvation

belongs to our Lord. And that's why we call on

the name of Jesus. But praise and worship is our

responsibilit Amen. Let us be that generation that generates praises.

Let us be that generation that makes a choice to

praise God in good times and in bad times. You know,

if the Lord is always like our wedding vows, good times,

bad times, but we still praise God good times, bad days,

you'll still say your wife is beautiful. You will you do?

Otherwise you'll be in trouble. That's the truth. And so

just as we keep our vowels to each other, even

more so, let's praise God, because it says, let all

that has breadth praise God and praise his holy name.

We hope you've been blessed by this message. For more

information on our church, please visit as church org. We

are also active on Facebook and Instagram. We're believing that

this week is going to be a good week ahead

for you.

God bless

M